Anora

Okay, this one came out of nowhere and blew me out of the water. I guess it won the Palm d'Or, which is French for "important film award." Anora is the story of a dancer/escort - basically a stripper that will go a little farther if she likes you and the money's right. She lives in Brooklyn and her grandmother came from Russia. She's full-on American, very Brooklyn butshe knows a little bit of Russian. She works at this strip club named HQ ... Cue the too realistic lap dancing scenes, as greazy as you want it, plus charmin' backstage chatter with the girls. And then one night the young scion of a Russian Oligarch comes in, sort of a good-time Charlie, or Ivan as the case may be ... and everything changes for Ani- when her boss asks her to attend to this guy, because she knows Russian.

Ani and Ivan party together, have sex, party all over town, all over the bed and the couch and the view home overlooking the Inner Bay - think that's Queens? – And then they're off to Vegas where he proposes to her – and what happens in Vegas definitely does not stay there. And here's where the move starts to surprise and feel less like a movie. So I've seen comparisons like, "This is Sean Baker's take on Pretty Woman" and he's The Florida Project guy, so maybe it is and maybe it isn't. But I think we all come into the movie with expectations. And plus Anoran and Ivan have such great chemistry, and she seems like just a good, down-to-earth Brooklyn girl. And despite the fact that he's an absolute brat, Ivan seems generous of heart and genuinely likable. He's going to straighten out, right? He's Hal from Shakespeare's Henry the 5th - that's the archetype. He's going to straighten out and fly right, grow up and take control of the ship. You really think that they might get married and live happily ever after. (Or maybe I'm just näive?) And so when the Oligarch's enforcers come, at first, and Ivan/Vanya runs off half naked down the street and Anora is stuck with the muscle, tough chick in distress, you think she's absolutely in the right, Vanya is going to come back, they will get through this. After all, they _are_ legally married, she's got the big 4 carat ring. But then sort of slowly it starts to dawn on her, and all of us, that Ivan is so charming and boyish and fun, that we are all taken in by him. It was all just a drunken lark. So they all end up chasing him. The Orthodox Priest that's supposed to be looking out for him and is on Daddy Oligarch's payroll; the two tough guys. And Anora. And here's where another expectation that gets turned sideways - the tough Oligarch people just come across like real people. That's how everything feels in the end, and what carries you along. You're with them, these real people, through this long horrible night. The sex is is a little too real. The drug usage is real. The barf is pretty real. The getting your car unhooked from the tow truck is real. The scenes around Coney Island are real. And most of all, the people are real - none of it is cartoony at all - no famous faces. Everything Nosferatu wasn't - Nosferatu was trying so hard to be a movie. This was just a horrible drugged out week. And all the while the tough guy Igor is looking out for Anora and the movie ends on a very real, sweet, human note. 

so that's that.